Page 88 of The Cabinet of Dr. Leng

“And to let her know she had a way home, in case she’d changed her mind,” D’Agosta said before he could stop himself.

Pendergast did not answer directly. “What I discovered confirmed my worst fears: Constance would not be content with saving her brother and sister. She intends to wreak vengeance on her former guardian.”

“You mean…Leng?”

“Yes, I do. She is so blinded by her desire for vengeance that she’s not thinking clearly. She cannot prevail over that man—not alone. If I don’t interfere, it will end in a way so awful I fear to imagine it. But I can’t do this by myself—certainly not without giving away my presence to Constance. I need you, old partner.”

“But…” D’Agosta began. Then he halted. His mind was in turmoil. If Constance had made this choice, who was Pendergast to interfere? Surely she’d reject his meddling if she knew.

He felt Pendergast take his elbow. “Let’s proceed to the library. We can talk more freely there—and I’ll do my best to answer the other questions I know you must have.”

And they left. For a moment, the lab was silent. Then Ferenc emerged from behind the housing of the machine’s secondary assembly, where he’d been running postoperative diagnostics. He stretched a moment, massaging his lower back. And then he stood motionless for several minutes, staring speculatively at the closed door, before returning his attention to the equipment.

56

DR. ENOCH LENG STRODEout of the chapel, converted to a foul-smelling dormitory, and into the antechamber of the Five Points House of Industry, snugging his thin leather gloves tight. He had finished ministering to the patients confined to the corner of the chapel that served as an infirmary: three consumptives, two cases of grippe, and one girl afflicted with gonorrhea. But before taking his leave, he had also examined a half-dozen young women as possible candidates. While he was disappointed to find that none was an ideal specimen for his needs, there were two that might be suitable, should he find no others on his next visit. To prepare for this possibility, he pronounced the two girls anemic and prescribed “vitamins”—actually, low doses of arsenic coated in sugar—so that, should he end up requiring them by the time of his next visit, they would present with sufficient nausea, abdominal distress, and neuropathy to justify transferal to his private sanatorium.

At the sound of his footsteps on the wide pine boards, Miss Crean, the nurse in residence at the workhouse, came forward, moving with all the appearance of a reanimated cadaver, wearing a long dark dress buttoned from neck to waist that served as a uniform.

“Are your rounds complete, Doctor?” she asked, her air of frosty authority checked by the presence of the eminent surgeon.

“They are indeed, Nurse.”

“And may I inquire whether our residents are all fit to work?”

“For the most part, yes. There are two, however, who bear watching. I’ve given them both medication for anemia. If they don’t improve, they may need further attention on my next visit.”

“Very good. And the five patients in isolation?”

Isolation, Dr. Leng reflected, was a relative term. “The consumptive Irish girl is poorly. The pestilence has spread throughout both lungs, and I don’t expect it to improve—especially in this damp and chilly weather. You might consider removing her to an, ah, even more isolated location; consumption is a disease of the vapors, you know, and proximity to others encourages transmission.”

He realized that, by saying this, he was in all likelihood condemning the small, red-haired girl to an even quicker death—Miss Crean would probably have her ejected, kicked onto the street, where in her current condition she would rapidly expire—but quickening the inevitable, he thought, might almost be considered humane.

Leng watched as the thin woman’s piercing eyes took this in, revealing nothing.

“I do have a request to make,” he said.

“Of course, Doctor.”

“You will remember the girl I admitted to my private sanatorium at the end of November—Mary Greene?”

Miss Crean nodded.

“You’ll be pleased to hear that she is much improved.”

Miss Crean nodded again. No doubt all of Dr. Leng’s patients improved…because none of them had ever come back.

“It has come to my attention that she has a sister—a younger sister. Her name is…” He made a show of taking a notebook from his breast pocket and consulting it. “Constance. Is she a resident of the workhouse? I inquire because her older sister, Mary, turns out to have a rare kind of disease which passes from mother to daughter, due to an imbalance in bilious humors—a superabundance of black bile at the expense of yellow bile. The sister will develop the same ailment as Mary, and it would be better to treat her now, at an age when it is still preventable.”

Leng had read Mendel’s articles on biological factors years before, as well as the lectures Louis Pasteur had presented to the French Academy of Sciences just that month under the titleSur les maladies virulentes et en particulier sur la maladie appelée vulgairement choléra des poules. But he knew most ignorant people, even doctors and nurses, still stubbornly clung to a belief in humorism.

“We have no such person at the House of Industry, Doctor,” she said. “I’m not aware that Mary Greene had a sister.”

“No? The Mission, perhaps?”

The nurse shook her head. “Is there any particular reason for your interest?”

“Yes.” And in fact, there was. As his shock at the confrontation over tea had eased, he’d become aware of a different feeling: familiarity. Specifically, the facial features of the duchess. But he was not going to tell this to Miss Crean. Instead, he said: “It’s because, while this disease is usually passed on within families, it also occasionally manifests with great virulence among the elderly—of the fairer sex, in particular.”

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